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Baseball provides ultimate support system for grieving Harrisburg Senators' coach

Rain and thunder storm delays Senators game with Reading

Harrisburg hitting coach Mark Harris returned to the Senators on May 23, less than two weeks after heart disease claimed the life of his wife Vickie at 53. The VH patch on Harrisburg's jerseys honor her memory, as do the initials written on their caps. Said Harris: 'I choose to think about the 36 years I had with her and not the ones I won’t have.'
(Mark Pynes | mpynes@pennlive.com)

'They were best friends. ... People wish they were that much in love with their spouse.' – Sens manager Brian Daubach on Mark and Vickie Harris

Mark Harris has a way of putting people at ease, a trait which serves him well as first-year hitting coach of the Harrisburg Senators.

"He's kind of like a father figure to all of us, just his presence in the dugout," said Sens' second baseman Cutter Dykstra. "I've been with him four years now, and when the time comes that he's not my hitting coach, I don't know what I'll do. I'll probably be calling him all the time."

"Coaches are huge influences in our career, and it's nice when you're comfortable with someone like Mark and you have a relationship where you can talk," said Harrisburg center fielder Michael Taylor.

Dykstra, Taylor and the rest of the Sens have rallied around Harris, whose wife, Vickie, died May 10 at age 53.

View full sizeVickie and Mark Harris met in church when she was 18 and he was 21. They dated four years and were married for 32 before she died May 10 at age 53 after suffering a heart attack.Harris family photo

"I don't feel sorry for myself, and no one else should either," Harris said. "I truly believe she's in a better place and she's healthy. I choose to think about the 36 years I had with her and not the ones I won't have.

"That's what I get up every day thinking, and I try, every day, to be like her. If you ask anybody who knew her, Vickie's goal was to make other people's lives better every day. I take that attitude. So talking about her and reliving things about her, I don't have a problem with it."

Vickie Harris suffered a heart attack just hours before scheduled double-bypass surgery in Virginia. She died five days later.

While Mark Harris won't allow himself to wallow, his extended baseball family is doing all it can to help him get through the loss. Pro sports provides an amazing support system on a daily basis, featuring workouts, games, travel from city to city and then more games.

"We spend more time here than we do in the offseason with our family," Taylor said. "You're around the same guys all the time and you get to know people very well. Everybody's hearts were broken when we heard what happened to Vickie."

Sens manager Brian Daubach knows Mark Harris well. This season is the third in a row where the two have worked together in the Washington Nationals' organization, having stepped up from the Single-A Hagerstown Suns and High-A Potomac Nationals.

Daubach has seen how much his coach and close friend has gone through.

"We're not in his position, so nobody really knows how he feels," Daubach said, "but he knows we're always there for him. Throughout it all, whatever we could do to help, whether it was a text or a phone call, we did it. We all care about him a lot."

Before joining the Nationals, the 56-year-old Harris previously scouted for the Philadelphia Phillies and Texas Rangers and served as minor league infield coordinator for the Kansas City Royals.

"Mark's a lot like myself, and has been in the game longer than me, but his whole life, he's had baseball and he had Vickie," Daubach said. "Unfortunately, she's not with us anymore, but he still has baseball. That's his passion. He loves trying to get the kids better, watching their progress."

* * *

Mark Harris was still a kid of 21 when he met 18-year-old Vickie Hall at a church in their hometown of Gainesville, Va., near Manassas. A first-round selection of the New York Yankees in the January phase of the 1978 draft, Harris was speaking to a youth group, which included his future wife.

"She didn't like me at all from the moment she met me," Harris said. "I was getting ready to leave for my first spring training, and one of my friends introduced me to her. She didn't know a thing about sports and didn't want to know anything about sports. I was some jock that everybody was making a big deal about. I was a hometown first-round draft choice.

View full sizeIn February 2013, Donna Lightner, left, donated a kidney to her sister Vickie Harris at the University of Virginia Medical Center in Charlottesville, Va.Harris family photo

"She wanted nothing of it, which is probably the main thing that attracted me to her, other than the fact that she was gorgeous and made me feel something right from the first time I saw her, something I'd never felt before."

The two wound up dating for four years and were married for 32. The couple has two children: daughter Rachael, 27, a chef who lives in Washington, and son Chris, 24, who lives at home in Gainesville.

While pregnant with her son, Vickie contracted gestational diabetes, which turned into a more permanent form of the disease. Her treatment, which included steroids over the years, caused kidney damage and Vickie needed a transplant.

"You never knew anything was wrong with her because she never said anything," Mark Harris said. "But being with someone for so many years, you know something's up. Two years ago when I was coaching in Hagerstown, we're at Denny's eating dinner after a game and she tells me she needs a new kidney, that it's no big deal and not that risky."

Mark Harris was tested and was found to be a match, quite a rare occurrence since they were not blood relatives. "A 1-percent chance" is how doctors explained it to him, but Vickie's sister, Donna Lightner, was a perfect match, so she was chosen as the donor.

The surgery was scheduled for November 2012, but before it could be done, Vickie experienced different, more pressing health issues.

* * *

"She came home from work one night and said she didn't feel good," Mark Harris explained. "All of a sudden she looked like she was going into this diabetic shock thing that had happened a few times before. I threw her over my shoulder and we live not far from the hospital. All her vitals were crazy and they told us she had heart trauma of some sort, but they didn't think it was a heart attack."

Tests revealed she had small blockages in two arteries, which would be monitored moving forward, so Vickie's transplant was delayed until February 2013 at the University of Virginia Medical Center in Charlottesville, Va.

View full sizeThe entire Harris family, from left, Chris, Vickie, Rachael and Mark, are all huge Chicago Bears fans. Mark and Vickie Harris made annual trips to Soldier Field plus one road game to see their favorite team in action.Harris family photo

"She went back to work in two months' time, working 40 hours a week and going to the gym three days a week, just loving life," Mark Harris said. "But this April, I called her one night and she said something was weird. She was out walking C.J., our lab, and said she got very tired. Not like work tired or exercise tired, but a lot of heaviness in her legs."

So Mark and Vickie went back to UVA, where a stress test and catheterization showed her blockages had gotten a little bigger. She needed double-bypass surgery, which was scheduled for May 5.

"Doctors said there was no imminent danger and she could take the rest of the week to get things straightened out at work," Mark Harris said. "They said, 'Come in and get it done Monday, and you'll be up walking around on Tuesday and doing the treadmill by Friday.'"

After the Senators wrapped up a road series against the Reading Fightin Phillies on May 4, Mark Harris drove home to Virginia, picked up Vickie and their kids, and headed off on an 82-mile drive to Charlottesville.

The family had dinner at a Waffle House, checked into their hotel within walking distance of the hospital.

"Eventually we get in bed at 1:45 a.m.," Mark Harris said. "I put my legs inside of her legs, put my arm around her, kissed her on the neck and said, 'You know how much I love you?' And she goes, "\'You know how much I love you?'

"At 3:20 in the morning, she throws the covers off and falls on the floor. I thought it was diabetic shock again. I knew she took her insulin, so this was different. My son was in the other bed. My daughter is in the other room. I jumped down on the floor and felt for a pulse. She didn't have one, so I starting giving her CPR."

When help arrived, Vickie Harris was transported down the street to UVA Medical Center.

"I'm thinking after the EMTs left that room with her, that might be the last time I see her alive," he said. "I really thought that, but when I got to the hospital they said she had a pulse and was breathing on her own, so I got a feeling things would be OK."

* * *

Doctors placed Vickie in a state of therapeutic hypothermia, a treatment which lowers the body temperature of cardiac arrest patients to help reduce tissue damage caused by lack of blood flow.

"You have to wait 48 hours, because they can't run any tests during this time," Mark Harris said. "All we could do is wait, and she looks gorgeous laying there. Her color was normal. Everything looked like she was just asleep."

The most awesome tribute by the Harrisburg Senators to Vickie before Fridays game!!! Incredible!!! Thank you so much! http://t.co/YAYhxfLY1h

By later that morning, word spread throughout the Nationals' organization, and Harris said he received more than 200 text messages and phone calls from front-office executives, staff, coaches and players. All the while, family and friends remained at her bedside, praying and comforting each other.

"I knew the neurological tests could be done on Wednesday afternoon because they were going to bring her temperature back up at 6 o'clock Wednesday morning," Harris said. "I spent Tuesday night in there, all night, so I go back to the hotel and I'm exhausted. I got in bed and set my alarm for a 45-minute snooze.

"I fall asleep and wake up shaking. Not a little shiver but all-out shaking and I can't control myself. I was awakened from a dream where Vickie throws off the covers, just like when she fell on the floor, but she got up on her knees, flexed her arms and said, 'Why is everybody so sad? I'm strong again!' It took me 30 minutes to calm down from that and everybody else is back at the hospital."

Always supportive of her husband's baseball career, she had one final encouraging message for him.

"In the dream she was telling me she was alright," Harris said. "She was going to be OK and I needed to take care of everybody else who was there: her mom and dad, our children, all these people. She was telling me that she'll be OK. Some people might not believe me, but it happened exactly that way."

View full sizeHarrisburg Senators players, many of whom have been with Mark Harris for two or more seasons, are firmly behind their grieving coach. Said outfielder Michael Taylor: 'Being back in the everyday routine and having everyone around him is going to help him a lot. We're here for him and supporting him the best we can.'Mark Pynes | mpynes@pennlive.com

Because of the dream, Harris was completely prepared when doctors told him Vickie had no brain activity. She would not be waking up.

"Sure, you keep praying for miracles," Harris said. "It's like my dad used to say: 'You don't give up the boat until the water hits you in the ass.' But the doctors came in and told me and my sister-in-law what we were facing. She was breathing 30 percent on her own and her kidneys were functioning perfectly, but there was no brain function whatsoever."

After consulting with doctors, the family decided her life-support tubes would be removed Saturday morning.

"They said it could take two hours [for her to pass away], two days or two weeks," Harris said. "You're just praying it happens quickly to spare people the agony of having to watch it happen. I said, 'Lord, put your hand on her and when it happens, please make it go quickly.'"

Vickie Harris died at 9:40 a.m. on May 10, less than 30 seconds after her machines were turned off.

* * *

There would be no funeral. Vickie Harris had always told Mark that when she died, she wanted a big party to celebrate her life. It's a request she repeated to her mother and sister on an April 26 trip to Nationals Park in honor of her sister's birthday.

Making good on his word, Harris threw a bash at the couple's Virginia home for 381 guests, which included family, friends and co-workers.

"There were people who hadn't seen each other in 15 years," Harris said. "People I played ball with, people she used to work with. It was absolutely the best time. I had 10 people leaving tell me, 'There's never going to be another funeral in my family. We're going to have parties.'

"Because when people left, they didn't have a bad feeling about what had happened. They were celebrating Vickie's life. All those people there, she impacted their lives one way or another."

View full sizeDespite losing his wife and best friend, Mark Harris maintains a positive outlook and isn't overwhelmed by grief. 'It doesn't mean that every once in a while I don't get drippy, but it's only because how much I loved her, not because of sadness.'Harris family photo

Harris returned to the Sens on May 23 after taking a leave of absence. He was overwhelmed in Harrisburg by well-wishes, gifts and a Metro Bank Park video scoreboard tribute to Vickie set to the music of Bruce Springsteen's "The Rising."

"It all just blew me away," he said, "but that's what people who knew Vickie felt. They wanted me to know they were going to miss her. I'm extremely grateful to the Nationals and the Senators for how supportive everyone has been."

Nats assistant general manager/vice president of player development Doug Harris isn't related to Mark, but the longtime friends refer to each other as brothers. Doug phoned Mark and told him Washington petitioned Major League Baseball and Minor League Baseball to allow the Nats and all of their affiliates to wear V.H. stickers on their helmets in honor of Vickie Harris.

Harrisburg players – some of whom have been with Harris for two or three straight seasons – also wrote V.H. on their caps, and V.H. patches were recently added to the sleeve of all Sens' uniforms.

One of the people Vickie Harris touched deeply was Daubach.

"It's pretty much what everyone would want their marriage to be," Daubach said of Mark and Vickie Harris. "They'd known each other since high school and they still had that kid love.

"They were best friends that had a special bond. People wish they were that much in love with their spouse. You just don't see that a lot."